


This Hell I'm Living

by Huggle



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Castiel/Dean Winchester First Time, Dean Hallucinates, Good Little Brother Sam, Hurt Castiel, Hurt Dean Winchester, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Protective Castiel, Protective Sam Winchester
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-22
Updated: 2015-11-22
Packaged: 2018-05-02 22:39:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5266454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Huggle/pseuds/Huggle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean gets taken by a Djinn.  To free him, Castiel has to go into Dean's dream but he is not expecting what he finds there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This Hell I'm Living

“There’s never just one,” Sam said. He reloaded the shotgun and scanned the shadows of the warehouse desperately. 

“I know,” Castiel said. He tore through the restraints suspending Dean from the ceiling, caught him, and sank into a crouch with the hunter in his arms.

“We need to go,” Sam said.

“I know.” Castiel pressed his hand to the side of Dean’s face, reached out to him and felt the wall created by the Djinn’s magic. It wasn’t impenetrable, but breaching it would take time and leave them vulnerable.

When the other Djinn were probably not far, there was no chance of doing it here. He lifted Dean up, hugged him to him and used his shoulder to nudge Sam towards the exit.

“Keep close,” Sam said, and led them outside. The Impala wasn’t far, tucked in next to a neighbouring warehouse. Sam opened the back door, and Cas laid Dean carefully out before climbing in next to him. He pulled Dean into his lap as Sam got in behind the wheel.

Sam hit the gas and the Impala tore away.

::::

Cas kept a close eye on Dean as Sam sped them back to the bunker. He kept glancing in the rear view mirror until Cas met his gaze.

“If you keep looking back you’re going to hit something,” he said. “I’m going to fix this, Sam.”

Sam stiffened, but he returned his attention to the road.

Cas left him to the driving and pushed his focus onto Dean. His pulse was slow, breathing erratic. As soon as the Djinn who’d poisoned him had been killed by Sam, Dean became unnecessary. The toxin would break down a lot faster and the effects become stronger very quickly. Ideally, Cas would have preferred to wait until they were safely back at the bunker to deal with it but he wasn’t sure now that they had that kind of time.

“How long?” he asked.

Sam risked a glance back at him and then at the speedometer. “Maybe an hour. Cas….”

“We don’t have an hour. You’ll need to watch over us. Get us back as quick as you can.”

He pulled Dean as close to him as he could; the more physical contact he had with him the easier it would be.

Sam was suddenly so distant from him. The car, the road, the world…everything outside of him and Dean was shoved back hard and brutally. He wasn’t strong enough, yet, for this, but that meant failing Dean. Even if it killed him, Castiel wasn’t prepared to let Dean die.

He realised the cry of pain was from him, and that Sam was yelling at him but that was the last thing he heard before darkness swallowed everything.

::::

He was standing outside a house.

Castiel frowned as he took in his surroundings. The house backed onto some woods, but a few hundred yards away he could see other houses, and beyond that some kind of wall. It was almost like a compound.

Djinn were clever in creating worlds so realistic that their victims were unaware they were dreaming. The more engaged in these false lives their prey became, the better the Djinn could feed, but they always took their inspiration from something known to the victim.

Or something they longed for.

Castiel felt regret twist bitterly inside him. Dean had had a life like this, with Lisa and Ben. During that time, Castiel had kept an eye on him. Distantly, but sometimes closer than Dean knew. He had heard Dean’s prayers and even if he couldn’t answer them directly without betraying Dean’s location to Heaven he had done what he could to make sure Dean was alright.

He had failed, as it happened, just as he had failed Dean before that and many times since.

And unless he found Dean here in this constructed reality and managed to pull him free, he would have failed him again – for the last time.

Pushing aside his guilt, Castiel approached the front door of the house. He pushed it open, and stepped inside. The hallway led back to the kitchen, next to a set of stairs leading down from the second floor.

He could hear voices from the kitchen.

One of them was Dean’s.

Cautiously, Castiel followed Dean’s voice. The hunter didn’t sound afraid, or upset. If anything he seemed happy.

Castiel heard him laugh, and two other voices joined in, higher pitched, excited.

Children, Castiel realised, and then he was close enough to see.

Dean was standing at the kitchen counter, with a boy and a girl to either side of him. The girl looked older, and she was watching Dean with a very focused expression.

“See,” she said to the boy. “Daddy’s showing us how to do it right. Making pie is very, very serious business.”  
“That’s right,” Dean said. “This is what we call a life skill.”

Castiel watched in stunned silence. Seeing what he had long known was Dean’s heart’s desire played out in front of him was painful on a level he almost couldn’t deal with. He was part of the reason Dean couldn’t have this. 

He wondered, in this reality, what Dean did have. Children, obviously. The blonde girl, a little taller than her dark haired brother. But a wife? Where was Sam in this world?

Djinn left no loose ends when they wove a reality. Whatever they had let Dean create for himself, everyone would be where they were supposed to, wherever Dean needed them to be so he could be happy.

It would be short-lived, like any happiness Dean found in his real life, because Castiel would have to wake him soon or lose him. 

He studied Dean – even though they were in his dream, Castiel could still gauge how well he was doing outside of it. He had time yet. He could let Dean have this a little longer, especially since Sam was guarding them in the waking world.

Sam would keep them safe so that Castiel could do this.

“You have a very strange concept of life skills,” someone said, and Castiel couldn’t turn around because he knew that voice.

He should – it was his own.

Castiel knew he couldn’t be perceived here, but he took an involuntary step back as he watched himself come down the stairs and into the kitchen.

The children ran to him, and he scooped them both up. He was soon covered in flour, on his face, in his hair, on his clothes. He set them back down next to Dean, and was greeted with a kiss to his cheek.

Dean had kissed him.

“You’re one to talk,” Dean said. “I had to teach you how to drive. And to shoo-“

Castiel watched his double press a finger to Dean’s lips. “I remember you teaching me other things we can’t talk about in mixed company, either.” He glanced meaningfully at the children. “I suppose they count as life skills as well.”

Dean smirked at him, and Castiel realised he missed that playful look Dean sometimes got. It had been a long time since he’d seen it. “Maybe tonight I’ll give you a refresher. Don’t want you getting rusty.”

“I wasn’t last night. Or this morning.”

This was… Castiel shook himself out of his stupor. Perhaps it was because Dean was dying, the Djinn’s poison corrupting his dream. Had he been partly infected himself? Pushing himself into Dean’s imaginings, had he exposed himself to it? He was still weak, still recovering. Before it never would have been necessary to consider contamination a possibility.

But that would mean that he had hijacked Dean’s dream, and this was the sum of his wants, not his friend’s.

Castiel pushed that notion away forcefully. Yes, he had felt longing and loneliness when he’d watched Dean build a life with Lisa. He had been missing both Dean and Sam terribly at that point, and even Bobby. In Heaven, he had only brothers who looked to him for guidance and leadership, and Raphael and his camp, who sought his destruction.

The only true family he had left had moved on. They were better off without him, anyway.

Now, as Dean would have said, that idea was coming back to bite him.

He had wasted enough time here.

“Dean,” he said, and stepped into the kitchen.

Everything wavered suddenly, and the children, his double, even the house vanished.

There were standing in the same warehouse where they’d found Dean being fed on.

“Dammit, Cas,” Dean complained.

“You knew?” Cas said. “You knew I was there?”

“Not my first rodeo,” Dean said. “Or my second. You get to know when they’ve fucked with your head. Anyway I figured you or Sam would haul my ass out at some point so I might as well go with it meantime. I was kind of expecting Sam slapping me awake, not you forgetting to knock.”

An apology stalled on his lips. He had trespassed, but even though he was shaken by what he’d seen and the embarrassment it had clearly caused Dean, it would be worth it to save him.

“We were running out of time. We still are.”

“That’s the thing, isn’t it,” Dean said. “We always are. Either it’s you or me or Sam. You getting taken, used, your Grace stolen. Sam, with the demon blood, the trials. Me, and the Mark. I don’t want to wake up one day and find out that’s it. That it’s over and I didn’t get to at least try to have what I want. What I need.”

He turned to face Castiel. He was shaking, and blood was pooling in the corner of his right eye.

“Dean,” Castiel said.

“You’re what I want. You’re what I need.”

Dean took a step towards him and his legs buckled. Cas caught him before he could fall, and followed him down as he had done before, keeping him secure in his arms.

“I need you too,” he said. “But unless you wake up right now, I will lose you, Dean. Please don’t let that happen.”

Dean patted his arm with a trembling hand. “Then wake me up, Cas. I’m ready to go.”

::::

Castiel jerked awake, instantly off kilter and confused. He had been in the car, and now he was….

Over Sam Winchester’s shoulder as the hunter bore him carefully down the staircase that led downstairs into the bunker.

“Hey, easy,” Sam said and braced himself on the railing. “Just let’s get off the stairs and I’ll put you down.”

Once he had, Cas had to grab his arm to keep himself steady. Sam looked ready to scoop him up again, but Castiel shook his head.

“I’m just…. Coming back out is never easy. Where’s Dean?”

“He’s ok,” Sam said. “He’s sleeping…normal sleeping. Whatever you did worked. He came out of it briefly in the back of the car then just kind of snuggled into you and fell over again. You were the one I was worried about. I couldn’t get you to wake up. Are you ok?”

It was a good question, and Castiel wasn’t sure he could answer it, not truthfully.

“I don’t know,” he said, and Sam grabbed his shoulders and turned him towards the living quarters.

“You’re bunking in with Dean,” he said as he marched Castiel forward. “That way I can keep an eye on you both at the same time. No arguments.”

Castiel had no plans to offer any.

 

::::

Dean slept until the next morning. 

Castiel didn’t sleep, but he did rest, and took the opportunity to speak with Sam in muted tones for fear of waking Dean.

They discussed many things: the bunker, the library Sam had found which he was eager to show Cas as soon as things settled enough for them to have an opportunity, the novel Sam was reading which he thought Cas might like to try.

“Healthier than Netflix,” he said, and Cas smiled.

Eventually, though, Sam asked the question Cas figured he had been working up to.

“Did you see what Dean dreamed about?”

Cas hesitated. It was an awkward question, one not easily answered or avoided. Dean and Sam had kept things from each other in the past and those secrets had driven a wedge between them. Things were better now, he hoped, but he had no way of knowing if there were still things they did not share with each other.

Would Dean want Sam to know of his dream? Was it even wholly his dream? And if he refused to tell, would Sam be hurt or offended? It might seem unfair to Sam that Castiel knew of Dean’s dream and yet as his brother he didn’t.

“It was…unexpected,” Cas said, finally. “But he seemed happy in it.”

Sam stared at him appraisingly. “I’m not going to push, Cas. I just worry. That time they got me, it was really hard coming back out of it knowing that I couldn’t get what I dreamed about. Hit me for six, so if he’s going to be the same I just want a little warning.”

Cas glanced down at Dean as he slept. He wondered what would happen when he woke up. 

“Perhaps it will be different for him,” he offered, and was grateful when Sam seemed to know that was the best assurance he could offer.

**

By the time Dean woke the next morning, Sam had made good on his promise to show Castiel the library. He’d helped the angel carry several tomes out to the kitchen, and left Castiel reading while he made some breakfast.

Maybe it was the smell of pancakes wafting through the hallways that roused Dean, but he staggered into the room just as Sam was plating them up.

“Books,” he warned Cas as he set a stack down in front of him. 

Cas obediently moved them aside and glanced down at his plate.

“Trust me,” Sam said. “I know you don’t need to eat anymore but doesn’t mean you have to miss out. And good morning, sleepy head.”

Dean grumbled something that could have been a greeting or a curse, and flopped down opposite the angel. When he saw the pancakes in front of him, his face brightened a little.

“Awesome,” he said, and was soon working his way through them.

Sam stared at him in mock alarm. “Remember you need to breathe.”

“Uh-huh,” Dean nodded absently, but his eyes were on Castiel as he carefully cut his pancakes into smaller pieces and forked one into his mouth.

“These are very tasty,” he said, once he’d finished chewing. “Thank you, Sam.”

Sam sat down with his own plate. “We should make this a thing,” he said. “Post hunt breakfast. You two can cook next time. Not pie.”

Dean coughed and turned an alarming shade of red. Castiel appeared behind him before Sam could even stand up, and pounded on Dean’s back until he waved the angel off.

“I’m ok,” he said hoarsely, but he was glancing suspiciously at Sam.

Sam stared back at him, a little nonplussed. “I didn’t put anything in them,” he said. “Try chewing before you swallow. Cas has got better table manners than you do, and you’ve been eating solids for years now.”

Dean got up suddenly, nearly backing into Castiel in his rush to get clear of the table. “Guess I’m still a bit off after yesterday.” 

He fled the kitchen before either Cas or Sam could say anything.

Sam stood up with a sigh and picked up Dean’s plate. “This is what I was worried about. Look, you saw what he was dreaming about. Go talk to him; or tell me what it is he dreamt so that I can go talk to him. Just…pick one.”

**

He found Dean sitting in his room, on his bed. His head was in his hands, and Castiel could feel how upset he was before he even went in.

“Dean,” he said.

“No,” Dean answered, without looking up. “Cas, I don’t want to talk about it.”

“What if I do? This doesn’t just affect you.”

He sat down next to Dean, and pried his hands down. Dean resisted, but without the Mark, and with Castiel’s Grace now restored, there was little he could do to pull away.

“Dammit, Cas,” he complained. “You shouldn’t even have been in there in the first place.”

“And you’d be dead now if I hadn’t been there. Would that be better? I’m sorry if I embarrassed or humiliated you, but your life was more important.”

Dean turned to glare at him. “Try ashamed. Look, I’ll understand if you’re pissed at me.”

Castiel stared at him, tilted his head as he tried to figure out the latest puzzle Dean had presented him with. He was getting better, a benefit of the long time he had known the hunter now, but every now and again Dean still managed to befuddle him.

“I won’t,” he said, finally, “because I can’t think of anything you’ve done to make me annoyed with you.”

“Really? Using you like some kind of wet dream?”

That phrase Cas understood, having heard it more than once from Dean. “It was hardly that.”

Dean’s cheeks reddened. “You should have got there earlier. Actually, forget I said that.”  
Castiel felt his frustration overtake him. Dean didn’t do conversations involving things as awkward as feelings very well, that being something else he should have been used to. He supposed he was no better at it himself, but for once he needed Dean to stop trying to avoid any topic he found too personal to deal with.

“I won’t forget,” he said. “I won’t forget any of it. You were the one who told me you didn’t want to miss a chance at having what you wanted. Yet you’re ready to throw that chance away. I don’t understand you, Dean.”

Dean turned around fully. He looked hurt, his eyes wide as he stared at Cas. “Don’t say that to humour me. I don’t need your self-sacrificing angel routine right now.”

“Is that what this is? I’m not as ready to throw myself on my sword these days as you think I am. If I let you have me, Dean, it’s because I want it too.”

“Prove it,” Dean said. “Show me.”

Castiel grabbed the front of Dean’s t-shirt and pulled him in close. He winced at the awkward clash of their mouths – Dean was probably used to more finesse in his partners – but Dean quickly took control. He reached up with both hands, cupped Castiel’s head, tilted it enough to give himself better access.

Cas released his hold on Dean’s clothing and moved his hand until it rested against the back of Dean’s neck. He could feel Dean shaking beneath his touch, and he started to pull back. 

“Don’t you dare,” Dean whispered as he leaned back enough to meet his eyes. “I want everything I had in that dream, Cas, and maybe I can’t have all of it but I can at least have this. If you want it too.”

“I’d be behaving rather strangely if I didn’t,” Cas told him. 

“Good point,” Dean said. He leaned in again, then his gaze drifted to over Castiel’s shoulder. “Hang on a minute.”

Cas frowned as Dean got up. He turned enough to see Dean close his bedroom door and lock it.

“Some things Sammy doesn’t need to see.”

**Author's Note:**

> Written for another SPN Kink Meme prompt:   
> _Dean gets whammied by a djinn and Cas jumps into his dream to get him to wake up. He finds Dean in an extremely domestic scene with his two children as he teaches them how to make pie. It pains Cas to take Dean away from such happiness and before he can pull himself together enough to do it he sees himself walk in and give Dean an affectionate kiss on the cheek. He's absolutely shocked._
> 
> _Dean is not, he figured out what was going on pretty quickly and decided that he'd give himself one day of domestic bliss before he fought back to reality._
> 
> _Happy ending of them letting each other know their feelings and longings._


End file.
